Heart of Louisiana: Allen's Acres

2017-10-11T03:25:07Z2017-10-11T03:29:59Z

Written by: Dave McNamara, Heart of Louisiana

Source: http://www.allenacresbandb.com/

(WVUE) -

“I call it growing butterflies from scratch,” Charles Allen said. “Go out and plant plants that would grow caterpillars and then the caterpillars turn into the chrysalis eventually into the butterflies.”

Dr. Charles Allen, a retired botanist and professor, has a yard full of flowers, butterflies and moths.

“I've been trying to record the number of moths that show up at my property, so I'm up to 640 species,” he said.

That's more moths than people who live in the small west central Louisiana town of Pitkin, population 576.

Mcnamara: Did you have any idea when you started counting that you would end up with more than 600 moths?

Allen: I didn't at first it was to get to 300, then to 400, you know each time, right now to get to 700.

Allen attracts the moths at night, on white sheets under a light. By day, a variety of flowering plants attract the caterpillars that turn into a chrysalis and then butterflies. There are monarchs, lots of yellow butterflies, the orange Gulf fritillary that starts as an orange caterpillar and transforms into colorful butterflies.

“Butterflies and moths generally live about two weeks, the flying ones, and most of these other things are about a week,” Allen said.

Allen is a big proponent of using native plants. His 26 acres are full of naturally growing Louisiana plants.

“There are many butterflies, many moths, many other insects and other animals that can only eat a particular native plant,” he said. “And if you brought in another, they're not going to make it.”